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The Top Five: Breaking down the Talladega spring race

Five thoughts after Sunday’s race at Talladega Superspeedway…

1. Super superspeedway racing

NASCAR designed the new rules package to improve the racing on intermediate tracks, with the other circuits — short tracks, superspeedways and road courses — catching shrapnel from the impact.

Superspeedways weren’t an afterthought, but it wasn’t necessarily designed with Talladega in mind. But it sure as hell worked here.

Talladega was an excellent race, harkening back to some of the 2000s-style restrictor-plate racing (way before the tandems and before the block-and-defend racing of recent seasons). This was a race where drivers could move from the back to the front — after penalties, for example — and just as quickly move from front to back if they got caught in the middle.

If anything, the leader in the final laps was going to be at a disadvantage. Had the race gone green before the late wreck that caused a red flag, Joey Logano probably would have lost anyway; the second-place driver could have laid back to get a run on Logano, and he likely wouldn’t have been able to stop it.

That’s a big-time departure from recent years, where the leader just controlled the lines and stalled out the momentum from whichever lane had energy.

This form of plate racing — er, tapered spacer racing — was much more entertaining and exciting. And yet it also didn’t seem to be too extreme on the danger side — which was a real worry before the race, given the major runs the drivers said they were getting.

When a superspeedway produces a spectacle like on Sunday — thrilling, unpredictable racing without anyone getting injured — it becomes a can’t-miss event. For those who tuned in or came to central Alabama on a beautiful weekend, it was worth the time investment.

That hasn’t always been the case, including last fall. So this was a welcome and refreshing day.

2. Cheering Chase

The fans really, REALLY enjoyed seeing good Southern boy Chase Elliott win in Talladega. Dawsonville, Ga. is closer to Atlanta, of course — but ‘Dega is still only two and a half hours away from the Elliott Kingdom. And he felt the love.

Elliott soaked up the cheers after the race, calling it “one of the coolest moments of my racing career.”

“It was awesome,” he said. “Just the postrace was unbelievable. I’ve never had a crowd that just felt like (it was) in the palm of your hands. You get excited, they get excited. You walk, they don’t say anything. You pump your arms up, they get pumped up. That’s just something that I’ve never really experienced.”

Elliott won three times last year, so you would think the crowd at Watkins Glen or Dover or Kansas would have reacted similarly. But while those races had plenty of cheers, Sunday’s were especially enthusiastic.

“You don’t know if that will always be that way,” Elliott said. “People might not like you in a couple years. Today is something I’ll never forget.”

So what kind of impact does an Elliott win have? In the NASCAR community, it’s a jolt of electricity. He excites the fan base — especially the traditional fans — and generates a lot of good vibes. Beyond that, I don’t think an Elliott win crosses over into the mainstream sports scene like a Dale Earnhardt Jr. or Jeff Gordon win did.

But if he keeps winning, he’s got a decent chance to make that happen eventually.

3. Chevy power

Imagine being Chevrolet at the Daytona 500 and the winning driver — in a Toyota! — goes to victory lane in part because your marquee team helped him during the race.

Uh…

Clearly, Chevy was alllllll about making sure that didn’t happen again. No more Hendrick Motorsports/Joe Gibbs Racing secret alliance. No more questions about loyalty.

Chevy wanted its teams to work together — to the point where the manufacturer had meetings with all of its organizations during the weekend — and emphasized guidelines for doing so.

Race together on the track. Pit together. Don’t help another competitor. And above all else, make sure a Chevy wins.

“Fortunately, everybody did that and it worked out really well,” Elliott crew chief Alan Gustafson said. “We needed to win this. We needed to consolidate our efforts. We needed to break the streak that one of our rivals has here.”

Not only that, but Chevy needed to win a race — period. JGR’s Toyotas and Team Penske’s Fords had won all nine Cup races this season. And had Logano won, that streak would have been 10 and counting.

Chevy has been beaten up this year by critics, and rightfully so. The manufacturer as a whole hasn’t been up to par compared to Toyota and Ford, and it seems to extend across its various teams. They’re behind.

So this was a big day, even if it was on a superspeedway.

“I’m really proud of all the Chevrolet drivers, crew chiefs, engineers, spotters, competition directors and team owners on how they worked together to get the best results today,” Chevrolet’s Jim Campbell said. “It was great to see Camaro ZL1 drivers in the top three spots and six in the top 10.”

4. Flipping out

Kyle Larson — one of the planet’s unluckiest race car drivers so far in 2019 — went for an unexpectedly crazy ride on the last lap Sunday.

I say “unexpectedly” because all he did was get doored by a spinning William Byron, which sent Larson sliding on the backstretch pavement. You wouldn’t have thought it would be anything more than that based on the start.

But suddenly the slide turned into a flip. His car went airborne, and he hit the interior wall — luckily, since clearing it could have been disastrous for onlookers — and sent Larson flipping and barrel-rolling for what seemed like forever.

“It’s been a long time since I’ve flipped like that in anything,” Larson said afterward. “I just didn’t know if it was ever going to stop and where I was at in reference to the fence or anything. It was scary, but thankfully it came to a stop tires-down.”

It was unsettling to see the car turn over by itself, and Larson said NASCAR would likely look into it. But after looking at the replay, perhaps damage caused by the Byron hit played into the incident by allowing air to get underneath the car.

Actually, let’s hope that is the explanation. Otherwise, NASCAR may have to get to work on figuring out how a car could do that on its own.

5. Why the caution?

Let’s try to clear up some of the confusion caused by the timing of the race-ending yellow flag.

When the caution originally came out, it seemed obvious NASCAR was reacting to the multi-car crash triggered by contact between David Ragan and William Byron, which ended with Kyle Larson flipping.

Not so, per a NASCAR spokesman.

Right before the caution came out, NASCAR said officials spotted a large chunk of metal debris from Ricky Stenhouse Jr.’s crash (later cited in Steve O’Donnell’s tweet) that was going to force them to throw a yellow flag. Officials didn’t feel it would have been safe to have the cars race back to the frontstretch with the debris there and possibly shoot it into the crowd if someone ran it over.

But just as officials were calling for the caution due to the debris, the backstretch incident happened and made it a moot point anyway.

The official race report listed the reason for the caution as the backstretch incident, but that’s not necessarily the case. Apparently, per NASCAR, the accident and the decision to throw the caution for Stenhouse happened at the same time.

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The Top Five: Breaking down the Dover playoff race

Five thoughts after Sunday’s playoff race at Dover International Speedway…

1. Harvick’s championship to lose

Once again, in the midst of the best season of his life, Kevin Harvick had the fastest car on Sunday. At this point in the year, it feels inevitable the No. 4 car will continue to unload that way each weekend.

No, Harvick didn’t end up winning. But he should have. The No. 4 team has let too many wins slip away over these last few years.

That seems to be the only thing that could prevent Harvick and his team from winning the title this year: A self-inflicted error like the one at Dover. Otherwise, the equipment is currently unmatched.

Harvick already has a career high in wins (seven). His average finish is currently the best of his career (8.6, even better than his dominant 2015 season). He’s on pace to earn a career high in top-10 finishes (Sunday was his 25th; best is 28) and perhaps even set a new personal mark in top-fives (he needs three more).

In the meantime, championship rival Kyle Busch hasn’t been as fast lately. Despite having his own career year for most of the season, Busch has now finished either seventh or eighth in four of the last six races — with the exception being the Roval and a short track (Richmond).

Seventh or eighth isn’t going to cut it at this point in the season — at least at Homestead. Busch has acknowledged as much.

What about Martin Truex Jr.? While the No. 78 team has been good, they aren’t Harvick-level good right now.

Here’s what is going to happen: Harvick is going to survive Talladega, win at Kansas and Texas and show up at Homestead as the favorite for the final four.

Still, Harvick might not win the championship. Days like Dover are still very possible,  and that execution will need to be shored up before they get there.

But you can bet wherever it matters for the rest of the season, he’s going to be the car to beat.

2. Don’t blame Bowyer

For the second time this season, Aric Almirola seemed to have a potential win thwarted by a caution caused by his own teammate — Clint Bowyer.

As he did at New Hampshire, Bowyer felt terrible about it. But he shouldn’t take the blame.

OK, so Bowyer’s team knew he had a potential mechanical problem and sent him back out. But what’s wrong with that? This is the playoffs! As we all saw last week at the Roval, EVERY point has the potential to matter. If Bowyer could limp around the track without falling apart, that might have been the difference in making it to the next round.

Besides, Almirola and his team still had the chance to control their own fate in some ways. Almirola was the one who overdrove the corner on the restart and made contact with Keselowski. That’s not Bowyer’s fault. And Almirola’s team could have put him in a different position (he could have stayed out or taken two tires like the cars in front of him). That’s not Bowyer’s fault, either.

Of course the situation was highly unfortunate for everyone involved, but let’s not declare “Bowyer costs teammate a win!” when that’s not entirely the case.

3. For Chase, now what?

Instead of being outside the playoff bubble heading to Talladega — a possibility at times on Sunday — Chase Elliott is already locked in to Round 3.

So what will he do with that opportunity? How far can Elliott go?

Elliott will probably have to win in Round 3, because he’s going to be up against the Big Three and their Big Playoff Points to make it to Homestead. Crew chief Alan Gustafson said as much after the race.

The Hendrick cars still haven’t been spectacular at most tracks this season — and the same for Chevrolet overall, really. Racing journalist Geoffrey Miller pointed out this was the first win for the Camaro on a non-plate oval (Chevy’s other wins this season were at Daytona and Watkins Glen).

If that’s the case, Elliott probably isn’t going to win at Texas or Phoenix — so it all comes down to Martinsville. Can Elliott win Martinsville? Obviously, yeah. He almost did last fall.

Still, it’s going to be tough. It’s not like one or two drivers are good at Martinsville; a ton of them are. But if Elliott can put together a magical race and get the automatic bid to the final four, we all know Homestead is capable of some unexpected twists.

Elliott as the 2018 champ? Unlikely, though not impossible. Stranger things have happened in NASCAR, but not many.

4. Johnson, Hamlin headed toward winless seasons

It’s looking more and more like Jimmie Johnson and Denny Hamlin will fail to win a race for the first time in their careers.

Dover might have been Johnson’s last, best shot this season — although we’ll never know, thanks to his bizarre mechanical failure on the pace laps. It’s so weird to think of Johnson as someone who can’t catch a break these days after he won seven titles and was Mr. Golden Horseshoe, but he sure seems to be a luckless driver in 2018.

Then there’s Hamlin. It’s much easier to picture Hamlin winning one of the final six races, since Joe Gibbs Racing brings competitive cars to a variety of tracks.

But Hamlin had a golden opportunity on Sunday and didn’t produce. He had fresher tires than Elliott and was starting on the front row for an overtime restart — something Elliott has struggled with in the past — and yet Hamlin was beaten straight up.

Hamlin earned some brownie points with Elliott fans, who have despised him since Martinsville last year. Was the possible blowback from another incident in Hamlin’s mind?

“After last fall, I was really making sure I didn’t make any contact, to be honest with you,” Hamlin said.

That’s unfortunate he felt that way, because perhaps racing more aggressively could have gotten him a win. On the other hand, can you imagine if Hamlin went full send and wrecked Elliott again while going for the lead?

Hamlin’s image might have never recovered from that, and a driver can’t afford to be that hated in today’s sponsor climate.

5. Talladega is going to be nuts

I’m happy Talladega is the middle race of Round 2 again this year, because it’s way too crazy to have it as a cutoff race. NASCAR doesn’t need to put eliminations on the line to have major drama at Talladega anyway.

Just check out the drivers from fifth to 10th in the standings: Joey Logano, Kurt Busch, Brad Keselowski, Ryan Blaney, Aric Almirola and Clint Bowyer. DUDE! That is a stacked lineup of some of the best plate racers in all of NASCAR.

Oh, and they happen to all need the points! There aren’t going to be any strategy plays or dropping to the back to be conservative among that group, because stage points are a big thing. 

The only thing to do is go like hell and hope they don’t wreck. That’s going to be verrrrrry interesting. I can’t wait.

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The Top Five: Breaking down the Talladega playoff race

Five thoughts after Sunday’s playoff race at Talladega Superspeedway…

1. Actually, it wasn’t a bad race

Talladega was a restrictor-plate demolition derby unlike anything we’d seen in a long time.

— Only 14 cars were still running at the finish — 14! — and only eight of those were still held together enough to actually race for the win.

— The 11 cautions tied a race record! Yep, none of the 96 other races run at Talladega have ever had more cautions than Sunday.

— Kyle Larson was a lap down — and finished 13th! Trevor Bayne, whose car appears on the crash report twice, finished third!

Given all that, it’s understandable if people look at the results and go, “Ugh, what a joke.” Not to go all #WellActually on you, but it really was a good race up until the point the carnage broke out.

Think about it: The first Big One didn’t take place until there were 17 laps to go. Prior to that, the field was two-, three- and even four-wide in a brilliant display of how good plate racing can be. There were lead changes and strategy and dicey moves, and no one spent time hanging at the back trying to avoid the wreck.

They actually raced.

Only at the end, when it was Go Time, did it really get crazy and kind of ridiculous. But that’s not really a surprise; after all, it’s Talladega.

As long as cars aren’t flipping or flying — which they didn’t on Sunday — the rest of it is just side effect of what was a pretty thrilling show.

2. Master Kes

For a last-lap pass, there didn’t seem to be too much excitement from the crowd at Talladega. The fans seemed deflated after Dale Earnhardt Jr. finished seventh, so even Brad Keselowski’s thrilling move didn’t save the day for them.

But it was fitting that Keselowski won Earnhardt’s final plate race, because it was a symbolic passing of the torch from the best plate racer of this generation to the next.

Keselowski has now won at Talladega five times and six wins overall in restrictor-plate points races. Earnhardt finished his career with six Talladega wins and had 10 plate wins in points races.

Though Talladega unquestionably contains a lot of randomness in surviving long enough to be there at the end, the actual winning moves often require a very specific skill. And Keselowski might be the best at it.

We often see the race leader be able to block a late run. But Ryan Newman couldn’t do it — granted, he had some degree of nose damage — and Keselowski ended up playing the finish perfectly. He deserves a ton of credit for the execution.

“You’d love to be able to pat yourself on the back and say it’s all skill, but there is some luck that’s involved in this,” Keselowski said. “… You know when you come here that probably three out of every four races you’re going to get caught up in a wreck or something like that happens.

“But the races where you have the good fortune, where you don’t get caught up in a wreck or you don’t have something break or any of those things, you have to take those races, run up front and win them. And I think that’s what we’ve been able to do.”

Junior Nation probably doesn’t give a crap about all this, given their disappointment, but it’s important to recognize we’re watching a rare and unique talent when Keselowski has the chance to win at Talladega.

3. Playoff race?

Fans still give Kyle Busch a hard time for saying Talladega and Daytona aren’t “real” racing. But seriously — is it? And does it belong in the playoffs?

Those questions are likely to pop up after a day when only two of the 12 playoff drivers finished on the lead lap.

“I’m sure there are a lot of competitors who say they wish (Talladega wasn’t in the playoffs), because you can’t control your own fate,” Denny Hamlin said after finishing sixth. “In no other sport does your competition make a mistake and it cost you. In our sport, it does.”

Hamlin suggested to NBC Sports last week that Talladega should be the regular season finale instead of a playoff race.

And indeed, that seems like a better solution. It doesn’t feel right in a lot of ways for the outcome of a championship to be impacted by an event with so much randomness. Because, let’s be honest: Kyle Busch was right.

Whether it’s “real racing” or not, though, it definitely won’t be changing anytime soon.

“I don’t know that there’s a desire to have a different product here at this type of racetrack,” said Ryan Newman, who was once one of the most outspoken drivers against plate racing.

4. Dale Jr.’s health

There were tens of thousands of people rooting for Earnhardt to win his final restrictor-plate race, which felt like his last, best shot at a victory before he retires.

Personally, I was just hoping he made it through the race without getting another concussion.

That sounds sort of dark, but it’s the truth. All season, I’ve thought in the back of my head: “I wonder if he can get through the plate races without suffering a huge hit.” And — luckily — he did. He had to make it through three close calls to do it, but he survived.

“This was one that I was worried about in the back of my mind,” Earnhardt said afterward. “I was a little concerned. But you can’t win the race if you race scared, and I’ve raced scared here before, and you don’t do well when that happens. So you have to block it out and just go out there and take the risks and hope that it’s just not your day to get in one of those accidents. And it wasn’t.”

Earnhardt fans didn’t get the win they wanted, but this was also a victory: Their driver competed for the win all day and left with his health intact, meaning he just has to make it five more races.

Wrecks can happen anywhere, but the chances sure are a lot lower at other tracks.

And along those lines, Earnhardt felt that by racing hard, he proved something to the critics who charged he has been too timid at times this season.

“Anyone who questions our desire to be here and compete this year and our desire to run hard and face can look at the risks that we took this afternoon, knowing that any of those crashes would have probably given me a bit of an injury that would have held me out of the rest of the season,” he said.

5. Pointed situation

Kyle Busch might not make it past Round 2 of the playoffs.

That’s crazy, isn’t it? All year long, it’s pretty much been a Martin Truex Jr./Busch/Kyle Larson show. Those three seemed to be the main title contenders going into the playoffs, and the conventional wisdom was Busch was at least a lock for Round 3 thanks to his 41 playoff points.

Welp…

Busch is currently seven points behind Jimmie Johnson for the final playoff spot entering Kansas. And Matt Kenseth is just one point behind him, so it’s not like he can focus just on beating one or two drivers next week.

Yeah, he could go win there — Busch has five straight top-five finishes at Kansas, including a victory last year in the spring. But there’s a very real chance he could fail to make the cut.

On a similar note, Johnson could be out if he doesn’t have a good run — which is also hard to believe.

I doubt many of us would have predicted two of the elite Toyotas or the seven-time champion would be in danger of failing to make it past Round 2, but that’s the case. And it’s going to make Kansas a very interesting cutoff race.

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DraftKings Fantasy NASCAR picks: Talladega playoff race

I’m playing DraftKings this season and will be posting my picks here each week. Disclosure: If you want to play and sign up using this link, DraftKings will give my website a commission.

Last race’s results: Played $4 Brake Pad contest. Finished 650th of 1,300. Won $0.

Season results: $97 wagered, $104.50 won in 25 contests.

This week’s contest: Due to stupid Alabama law, I cannot submit an entry this week.

Talladega strategy: Don’t look at practice times, just look at qualifying and focus on place differential. In this year’s Daytona 500, the perfect lineup was made up of drivers who all started 30th or lower. Try to find drivers in the back of the field who can make up spots, regardless of how much salary cap money you leave on the table. It’s all about place differential.

Talladega picks: 

— Aric Almirola ($6,300): Since the start of last season, Almirola has the third-best average finish in restrictor-plate races of any driver (11.67, which is behind only Kurt Busch and Ricky Stenhouse Jr.). That makes him worth including, especially since he starts lower (26th) than other expert plate drivers.

— Michael McDowell ($6,000): He starts 29th in his first plate race since finishing fourth in the Daytona July race. He crashed in the Talladega spring race, but was 15th in the Daytona 500, 16th at Talladega on year ago and 10th in last year’s Daytona July race. Another good value pick.

— David Ragan ($5,800): A past Talladega winner who has finished 10th and sixth in his past two restrictor-plate races — and he starts 33rd? Put him on the team.

— Landon Cassill ($5,600): He starts 30th and his Talladega history in the last three years includes results of fourth and 11th (twice). Even if he gets a top 20, that’s picking up some decent points for you.

— Brendan Gaughan ($5,300): His three restrictor-plate races this season in the Cup Series include finishes of 11th and seventh. Pretty incredible value if he can do it again at Talladega after starting 35th.

— Cole Whitt ($5,000): He starts 38th, but that’s an opportunity. Before blowing an engine in the July Daytona race, Whitt’s previous restrictor-plate finishes were 16th (at Talladega in the spring), 18th (Daytona 500), 11th (July Daytona race last year) and 18th (Talladega spring race last year). So…hello!